Ides By Nine
by Cyprith
Summary: Nine years is nothing, really. Not when it all works out in the end. A fluffy, happily ever after of sorts. JxS


Title: Ides by Nine

Author: Kytten

Pairing: Jareth/Sarah

Rating: PG

Summary: After nine long years she'd almost convinced herself. Almost. Jareth has a way of changing things.

Author's Note: Disturbed with the lack of romantic comedy on here. Every romance seems to be angst and every comedy seems to be a parody. I'd just like to see something fluffy and _light_ for once. -.-;

This is scatter brained and silly but at least it's a light antidote to teh-angst in this place. XD

* * *

Nine. One less than ten, one more than eight. The proper number of Buddhist monks. The atomic number of fluorine. Nine muses even, Sarah thought as she lit the candles on her coffee table. Nine planets. 

Nine boyfriends she's had since then.

Nine boyfriends who never quite measured up.

Nine men who didn't look good in leggings.

Nine men who couldn't play the prince, let alone the king.

Nine men she dumped with a, "It's you. It's definitely _you_."

Nine years since she'd both met and destroyed Mr. Right.

_Can you even call a king mister_, she wondered miserably, sprawled ungracefully over the couch.

"Pathetic, really," she murmured to herself, watching the candles flicker in the dim of the living room. "Nine years and not a word. There's stubborn, Jareth. And then there's _you_."

Covering her eyes with the back of a cool hand, she sighed.

"I know you're listening. You're _always_ listening. And you're not all that clever, you know. I can hear your goblin in the kitchen…" there was an awkward pause. "Or Charley. It could be Charley."

She sat up a little to listen. She could hear a sort of _clacking_ sound on the linoleum, but it wasn't the clack of a clumsy puppy with a bad habit of sliding into walls.

"Charley?" she called tentatively, easing up off the couch.

From behind the television, a fluffy little head poked out, tongue lolling and covered in dust bunnies.

Something in the kitchen _snorted_.

"Oh, very smooth," she muttered and stalked over to the bedroom door. In the joint where door met wall, she kept a baseball bat. "I might even be impressed if this hadn't happened a hundred times before."

* * *

One hundred and thirty five, actually. Which is nine by fifteen. Perfect seeing as how it's been nine years since they first met on March fifteenth. The day she watched the Labyrinth shatter. The day she looked into his eyes and saw the world, all the while knowing that no matter how much she wanted to, she couldn't say _yes, I love you, I'm yours, forever._

* * *

The clacking stopped. Baseball bat held up over her head, she stomped towards the kitchen, attempting to sound as loud and ominous as was humanly possible. Downstairs, the lady who lived just under her pounded a broom on the ceiling. 

But then, she'd never dealt with goblins.

Making a mental note to toss them into her window next time, Sarah made a very dramatic leap into the kitchen.

Had there been a goblin, it would have been very impressed.

Instead, there was a tiny little saddle sitting oh so prim and proper on the counter next to the calendar with March 15 furiously scribbled off.

Using the bat as a walking stick now, Sarah wandered over to see if this little gift had come with a note.

_There_— a little flap of paper sticking from the curve of the saddle.

* * *

_Ambrosius had puppies._

* * *

Sarah laughed, fingers stroking over the leather of the tiny saddle. She was almost afraid to ask _with who_. As far as she knew, there weren't any other dogs in the Labyrinth. 

But then, that was taking for granted Ambrosius was a dog at all. It was entirely possible that in the Labyrinth they considered _Jareth _a dog.

Or a rat. Hoggle could have meant it literally.

Sarah sighed, laughing at her own foolishness and the fact she fully meant to put Charley in his new little saddle. He could prance about with one of her smaller bears on his back. _That'd _be worth taking a picture of.

But not right now. What she needed right now was a good movie, her pint of Double Death by a Chocolate Chunky Monkey and possibly even that bag of cookie dough she'd frozen last week. It was definitely a day for indulgences.

Dropping the baseball bat in the sink, she padded over to the refrigerator.

Her ice cream was gone. As was her bag of cookie dough.

"Oh, _low blow_, Jareth. I am mortally wounded and shall now crawl off to die." And then, perking up at the thought as it occurred to her. "Possibly in a nice bubble bath."

Good humor restored, she swept the bat up from the sink and danced out into the living room to the song that'd been stuck in her head for the last week.

* * *

Seven days. Seven being the number of times she'd thought about going back. The number of times she'd stood up to say the words and lost her nerve somewhere just past _I wish_. The number of times she'd wondered, _he'll never be perfect, but can he just be good enough?_

* * *

Which was funny, considering that thought, that song should strike her just as she caught sight of Mr. Perfect (His Majesty the Perfect?) sprawled on her couch, eating _her_ Double Death by a Chocolate Chunky Monkey with _her_ bag of cookie dough resting at his hip… in socks that she rather suspected didn't match. 

Sarah burst out laughing, tears in her eyes. There was no way to describe the sense of absurdity, relief, ecstasy, embarrassment, longing, tenderness, love, hate, completion, perfection that cascaded through her in that instant.

"Sarah?" Jareth sat up, the ice cream balanced perfectly on one knee, laughter hiding like a kiss in the corners of his mouth. "I'd rather expected I'd at least manage a bit of a cuddle, but here you just thunder around waving a large stick. Come _here_, would you?"

She smiled, feeling childish and perfect and complete for the first time in nine years. And just then, she really couldn't work up enough negative emotion to hide the pure joy welling under her breastbone. So instead, she secreted herself away in the gentle curve where Jareth's side pressed against the couch, and once he'd been properly conquered, stole the ice cream.

And when she cried during the movie and somehow stained his shirt with Double Death by a Chocolate Chunky Monkey, he couldn't bring himself to care.

Nine years was nothing, really.


End file.
